Explaining NAMI

The National Alliance on Mental Illness is actually another beautiful parent/child story. A group of mothers got together in the late 1970's when they saw that their children were having major psychiatric illnesses and realized that together they could help figure out how to help their children, how to advocate to change the service system for the better.
So NAMI now represents a thousand chapters across the country. So if you feel that you've been struck by lightening, or picked on by God, or some other larger force, because you have a child who has an emotional problem or even a mental illness, you should know that there's a whole group of people that are there to worry with you, support you and help make the world a better place for people like your child.

Kenneth Duckworth, MD

Psychiatrist, Harvard Professor & Medical Director for NAMI

Ken Duckworth, MD, serves as the medical director for NAMI, the National Alliance on Mental Illness. He is triple board certified by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology in Adult, Child and Adolescent, and Forensic Psychiatry and has extensive experience in the public health arena.

Dr. Duckworth is currently an Assistant Clinical Professor at Harvard University Medical School, and has served as a board member of the American Association of Community Psychiatrists. Dr. Duckworth has held clinical and leadership positions in community mental health, school psychiatry and now also works as Associate Medical Director for Behavioral Health at Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Massachusetts.

Prior to joining NAMI in 2003, Dr. Duckworth served as Acting Commissioner of Mental Health and the Medical Director for Department of Mental Health of Massachusetts, as a psychiatrist on a Program of Assertive Community Treatment (PACT) team, and Medical Director of the Massachusetts Mental Health Center.

Dr. Duckworth attended the University of Michigan where he graduated with honors and Temple University School of Medicine where he was named to the medical honor society, AOA. While at Temple, he won awards for his work in psychiatry and neurology. He also has a family member living with mental illness.

The National Alliance on Mental Illness is actually another beautiful parent/child story. A group of mothers got together in the late 1970's when they saw that their children were having major psychiatric illnesses and realized that together they could help figure out how to help their children, how to advocate to change the service system for the better.
So NAMI now represents a thousand chapters across the country. So if you feel that you've been struck by lightening, or picked on by God, or some other larger force, because you have a child who has an emotional problem or even a mental illness, you should know that there's a whole group of people that are there to worry with you, support you and help make the world a better place for people like your child.